đź“– Chapter 3: The Thing in the Trees
336 Words
The footsteps behind me grew louder.
Fast.
Too fast.
I ran without thinking.
Branches scratched against my arms as I pushed through the trees, my heart pounding so hard it hurt. I could hear the footsteps chasing me, heavy and uneven, always just a few steps behind.
“Help!” I shouted.
But the village answered with silence.
I didn’t dare look back.
The path ahead twisted deeper into the woods behind the abandoned well. The sunlight barely reached the ground here, blocked by thick branches overhead. Everything smelled damp and rotten.
Then I heard it again.
Laughter.
My laughter.
It echoed from every direction at once.
I stopped suddenly, breathing hard.
The footsteps behind me stopped too.
Silence returned.
Slowly, I turned around.
Nothing.
Only trees.
Only shadows.
I forced myself to breathe.
“This isn’t real,” I whispered. “This can’t be real.”
A familiar voice answered from somewhere nearby.
“Then why are you shaking?”
Linh.
My eyes widened.
“Linh?! Where are you?”
No answer.
Then, softly—
“Help me…”
The voice came from inside an old wooden house hidden between the trees.
I had never seen that house before.
Its door hung slightly open, moving slowly with the wind. The walls were covered in dirt and dark stains, and the windows were completely black.
Every instinct told me to run.
But Linh was inside.
I stepped toward the house carefully.
The floorboards creaked under my feet as I entered. The air smelled old, wet, and wrong.
“Linh?” I called again.
A weak sob came from upstairs.
I climbed slowly, gripping the railing with shaking hands.
One step.
Two.
Three.
Then I noticed something on the wall beside me.
Scratches.
Hundreds of them.
As if someone had tried to claw their way out.
My chest tightened.
The crying upstairs suddenly stopped.
Complete silence.
Then—
Creak.
A door slowly opened at the end of the hallway.
And standing inside the dark room…
was me.
- Writer
